


Gravity Always Wins

by writeivywrite



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-21
Updated: 2013-06-21
Packaged: 2017-12-15 17:40:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/852244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writeivywrite/pseuds/writeivywrite
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The truth is: if they weren’t in a band together, Zayn wouldn’t be friends with someone like Louis.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gravity Always Wins

 

 

Zayn thinks about it too much sometimes – why me? He lies awake some nights, playing with the pendants on his necklace like he’s counting tasbih as he asks himself what would have happened if he’d gone to that first X Factor audition. Talent’s talent, his mother says, but he’s not so sure he believes that, not deep down. Not when he passes a busker in the street who’s so good it makes him stop mid-sentence or when the end of X Factor neared and all the people he was sure would win were no longer in the room.

First it was Gamu. They were on their way to audition at Simon’s house when they heard. They were all a bit giddy and slightly hysterical at being in Marbella, their faces pressed against the windows of the minibus when they left the airport, watching the palm trees flick past and the glimpse of blue between each one, then Harry got the text and it was so quiet that Zayn could hear the sea rushing at the rocks. ‘But she’s such a good singer,’ he said, almost to himself, hands shaking like they had an hour before when the plane cut through the clouds like a teaspoon through the head of a cappuccino to dip towards the sea. ‘But Katie will make better telly,’ Louis said, turning his face away and Zayn still isn’t sure which Louis scares him more, the fierce, funny Louis who could probably stop a horse mid-gallop with a look or that Louis, the Louis who hasn’t grown up yet but already knows too much. That day he scared them all and they sat a little straighter as it dawned on them that it didn’t matter what they sang – or how they sang it – because in the end it came down to whatever that unknowable, uncontrollable thing Simon was looking for and there was absolutely nothing they could do about it.

But then Zayn’s never had any control over any of this. From the moment his mother first heard him singing in the shower and he walked out of the bathroom to find her waiting for him, tears in her eyes, singing ceased to be this quiet, secret thing. He tried to keep it that way, tried to shrug her off and tell her not to be so melodramatic as he retreated to his bedroom. But a few minutes later, when he was looking for a clean school shirt to wear, he realised that he was singing again and he hadn’t even noticed.

That’s when he realised that he couldn’t help it. Singing was this thing he did without trying, like breathing. He only stopped when he caught himself doing it, or if someone told him that he had a nice voice, then he got flustered and his voice would falter as though he’d been called upon to answer a question in class. He never understood it, though, not really, not until he met Charmaine Campbell a few months later. She lived two streets away from him and had hair the colour of _Lyle’s_ black treacle and as soon as he made the comparison – something he’d never felt the need to do before then – he knew. He didn’t know _what_ exactly, he just knew that the mere mention of her name was enough to make his fourteen-year old heart throw itself against his ribs. Then the time came, weeks later, when they were at her fifteenth birthday party, the two of them sitting on the wall outside her house, his jacket hanging on her shoulders because she was cold, and he leaned in to kiss her, but she turned her cheek away and the shock of it almost made him jump off the wall and run all the way home.

They never spoke again but that thing – whatever you want to call it, love maybe, if you can call it love when it isn’t reciprocated – the thing that kept him up at night thinking about the soft sweep of her mouth or made him sit next to a girl on the bus because she had hair the colour of _Lyle’s_ black treacle, didn’t go away. It should have – he wanted it to – but it didn’t and that terrified him, that there were parts of him, parts he was attached to, that he needed to survive, that he had no control over. Charmaine Campbell was gone but some part of him still remembered her and it was the same with singing. He couldn’t stop that, either, and it’d break his heart as well because, as his grandmother told him once, you should never fall in love with something you can lose.

But what about the things you love that you don’t have? Zayn was close – he was _there_ , on the X Factor, singing like his life literally depended on it – but he didn’t _have_ it. He was closer than most, though, because after Gamu there was Nicolò then John then Treyc and every week the sweet relief of hearing Dermot say One Direction was dampened when he had to say goodbye to someone who had a better voice than him. Yvie told him off when he said that in rehearsals. She’d find him in whatever corner of the studio he was hiding in (usually the broom cupboard on the first floor, surrounded by damp mops and bottles of bleach because he could practice his part and no one could hear), and tell him that he had the best voice she’d heard in years. But then he was sure she’d said the same to Nicolò and John and Treyc so it didn’t make him feel any better.

Aiden going was the worst, though. ‘I’m too weird for this, I think,’ he said with an awkward shrug, pulling the cuffs of his cardigan over his hands, and Zayn couldn’t look at him because it was just like Aiden to say something like that. Not ‘I’m too good for this’ or ‘I’m too old for this’ like the others had. Zayn wanted to tell him that he was weird, too, but it wasn’t about him, so he said all the right things about it being just the beginning and being sure that he’d get a deal. Harry was in bits, though. Zayn worried about him sometimes, about how attached he got to people. But then that was Harry, as Louis said when Aiden moved out of the house and Harry sobbed until he was hiccupping. There probably wouldn’t be a band if Harry didn’t hold onto everything with both hands.

Zayn thought saying goodbye would get easier after that, but it didn’t and the other lads must have felt the same way because every Sunday night they made the same promises about keeping in touch as they said their slightly stuttered, slightly apologetic goodbyes. Survivor guilt Louis called it the night Paije left, when they were sat in the dark of the garden while Zayn smoked a cigarette. He caught Louis looking back at the house as though he was trying to memorise the shape of it, to count the windows and remember which was his, like he was breaking up with someone he knew he’d never see again. Then Zayn found himself doing the same thing as he wondered if he would see Paije again – or Nicolò or John or Treyc or Aiden. He did, but it was always in a rush, before he was swept off to make up or to talk to someone from _Heat_ magazine. Then he’d get a text from one of them to say they were going home – _home_ home – back to their single beds and their jobs in call centres to work all year to save up for a week in Magaluf. Back to the life that was destined for him before Simon tossed him that lifeline at bootcamp and saved him. And every time they did, Zayn was sure he would be next.

Louis got that, Zayn knew. He and Louis were the only ones who didn’t unpack, who didn’t have photos stuck by their beds or a favourite mug in the kitchen. But that was them; if Harry cried until he hiccupped, then he and Louis pretended not to care. They did, of course, they all did, but the others didn’t have that same hunger, that same need to get out. Zayn didn’t even have a passport before he joined the end of the queue that drizzly morning in Manchester and by the time the X Factor final approached, he’d seen more than most people see in their lifetime. And he got to sing, to feel the weight of a microphone in his hand and the hum of a crowd in his bones and he wasn’t going back.

He couldn’t go back.

Louis couldn’t go back, either. Zayn saw that every time he lost his temper when one of them fucked up their part or was late to rehearsal. Louis wanted it, too, wanted it in such a deep, distracting, dizzying way he couldn’t lift his head when Dermot read out the results each week. It was the first thing he and Zayn had in common, not just that hunger, but they both _needed_ it. They needed the other lads because without them Louis would give into that voice in his head that told him he couldn’t sing and Zayn would give into the one that told him he looked like an idiot and that would be it. But when the five of them were together, they didn’t think about those things.

When they were together they could do anything.

The others got carried away by it, though, listening to the rumours that got more persistent each week, the ones about record deals and Simon going to LA to meet with Lady Gaga’s producer. But Zayn ignored them because he had to, because he couldn’t get his hopes up. And if he did, if his heart fluttered when Harry woke him up in the morning by jumping on his bed and singing Poker Face, Zayn would make himself think of bootcamp, of standing on that stage and waiting to hear his name and the moment of hope would pass as quickly as it came because he never wanted to feel that again. Never.

He guessed Louis didn’t want to, either, because while the others were bickering about what they wanted to call their first album, Louis was making jokes about whether being on X Factor would earn him an extra star on his name badge when he was working in _McDonalds_. And that’s how it went for weeks – Louis making jokes while Zayn hid in the broom cupboard. Until the night before the final when he and Louis were in the living room watching the end of a Nicholas Cage film while everyone else was in bed. ‘It’s like I’ve blagged my way into the VIP section of a club,’ Louis said suddenly, resting his feet on the coffee table. ‘I keep waiting for someone to realise and kick me out.’ He laughed and Zayn laughed, too, not because it was particularly funny, but because he was trying to dislodge the lump in his throat as he thought of rehearsals, of standing between Liam and Harry and wondering if anyone would notice if he wasn’t there.

Rebecca was the first person to see it. Maybe not the first, but she was the first to make him think that perhaps Yvie wasn’t flattering him, who told him to just close his eyes and sing. And okay, they didn’t win, but once the sting had passed, it didn’t feel much like losing, either, so maybe that’s why he fell so hard for her. Not so much for her, rather _them_ and the Zayn he was when he was with her. Zayn with a Y who wanted to sing better and treat her better and _be_ better for her. Which is why it hurt so much when they broke up, because he couldn’t be. Or maybe, as Louis pointed out, having a _Jack Daniels_ epiphany in the back of a cab one night, Rebecca never wanted him to change.

It knocked the air right out of him because Louis always does that. The other lads were kind and told Zayn what he wanted to hear – _Forget her_ , _Zayn_ and _She was too old for you anyway_ , _Zayn_ and _It was never serious, though, was it, Zayn?_ – but Louis had to say something so bone breakingly honest it made him want to cry. That’s why he thought they’d never be friends, because where Louis didn’t hold back, that’s all Zayn did. When Zayn was upset about something, he sat on his bed listening to something familiar, something that reminded him of home and singing in the shower.

The truth is: if they weren’t in a band together, Zayn wouldn’t be friends with someone like Louis. They had nothing in common. Nothing. Louis would laugh and do an exaggerated RnB run if he walked past Zayn’s bedroom and heard him singing and Zayn always fell asleep when it was Louis’ turn to pick the film. But more than that: they didn’t even enjoy each other’s company. Louis thought Zayn was a moody fuck and Zayn thought he was a bit of a prick most of the time so he never understood why Louis came looking for him sometimes. It’s not like they talked. Louis would just wander over when Zayn was sitting on the bench in the garden and say, ‘Alright, mate?’ then sit next to him without looking at him. Each time he did, Zayn would frown and wait for him to say something, but he never did. But then Zayn didn’t, either, so maybe that’s why Louis went looking for him. If you need advice, go to Liam, if you need to laugh, go to Niall, if you need a hug, go to Harry and if you don’t want to talk, go to Zayn.

With hindsight, it was strange to spend that much time with someone he wasn’t friends with, but then the whole thing was strange. And it’s not that Zayn _disliked_ Louis, they were just too different. Sometimes it felt like everything Louis did was in direct defiance of him. If Zayn had a headache, that would be the moment Louis would start a water fight with Harry in the kitchen and if Zayn was about to pull in a club, Louis wanted to go home early. Harry said that they just needed to find some common ground but that was the problem: there wasn’t any. They didn’t even know how to talk to each other. Where Zayn questioned _everything_ , Louis had a fucking answer for everything. But that’s one of the things he likes about Louis: he always knows where he stands with him. Zayn just didn’t realise _where_ he stood until tonight.

They’re at a party, a record company thing at the Groucho that sounds much more glamourous than it is. It’s mostly twitching overeager middle aged men in suits who’ve had too much coke and champagne and want to tell them all about the boy bands they’ve worked with. It’s amusing at first, but during an excruciating story about Robbie Williams that Zayn could have lived out the rest of his life never hearing, he gets a flash of Simon at a party like this in ten years, the skin around his eyes creased as he laughs and tells a story about him and Zayn suddenly doesn’t want to be there. That’s when Rebecca sweeps in and he has to fight the urge to turn and run.

Their gaze meets and Zayn isn’t sure who looks away first, but he doesn’t look at her again for the rest of the evening, deftly avoiding her at every turn. When she’s at the bar, he goes to find Harry, and when she strays towards the corner he’s giggling with Harry in, Zayn side steps her and goes to the toilet. So she does it on purpose, he knows, stands close enough – and speaks loud enough – for him to hear. ‘X Factor’s nothing to do with talent,’ she says to the journalist she’s talking to, then flicks her hair and shrugs elegantly, ‘and everything to do with luck.’

Zayn’s jaw clenches but he takes it on the chin because he deserves it – he does, it wasn’t all his fault, but he was still a dick – but then he feels Louis tense beside him. If it was anyone else, he would sling an arm around his shoulders, maybe nudge him with his hip and tell him that it wasn’t aimed at him, but it’s Louis, and the look on his face tells Zayn that if he’s going to say anything, he should approach him with a whip and a chair. Even Harry hesitates before he gives him a clumsy hug and presses his mouth to Louis’ ear to tell him something that Zayn probably doesn’t want to hear.

He’s never been good at these things and Harry seems to have it covered, so Zayn leaves them to it and heads outside for a cigarette. The terrace is packed so he turns and walks straight back into the bar again because he doesn’t have the strength to deal with another music exec groping at him and trying to slip a wrap of coke into his palm. But when he walks downstairs and the bouncer opens the door for him with a nod, he immediately regrets it and steps back as he’s confronted with a flurry of flashes. He doesn’t know what he was thinking – it’s the Groucho, for fucks sake – but he still isn’t used to it, to walking out of a door and having a camera shoved in face.

He should go back inside, but his instinct is to keep walking and he turns right, heading up Dean Street. He can hear the photographer behind him, so waits for a black cab to pass and crosses the narrow street. He follows and Zayn’s stunned, wondering if it’s a slow night because he can’t possibly be interesting enough to follow down the street. But then he hears it – ‘Did you cheat on Rebecca, Zayn?’ – and his shoulders tense.

‘You’ve got your shot, mate. Leave him alone,’ someone says and suddenly Louis’ next to him. The pap is undeterred and runs around them so he’s facing them. He walks backwards, taking photos as he asks Zayn again if he cheated on Rebecca. Zayn ignores him, biting down on his bottom lip and looking at his new shoes, which he can’t wait to take off because they’re pinching his feet, and prays for a loose pavement slab for the pap to fall back on. But then Louis tells him to ignore him and it’s nothing – just a couple crossly muttered words – but Zayn finds it oddly comforting because Louis isn’t taking the piss or making a joke. There’s an edge of protectiveness in his voice that he’s only ever heard when he’s talking about Harry and as Louis takes him by the sleeve and steers him left down a side street, Zayn’s suddenly glad that he’s there.

The pap follows and Louis shakes his head. ‘Come on, mate.’

‘You’re very vocal, tonight, Louis,’ he says, running around them so he’s facing them again. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever heard your voice. I thought you only mimed.’

Zayn loses his temper then and he can’t remember the last time he snapped like that. He goes from _Leave me alone_ to _I’m going to kick your head in_ in three seconds flat. He doesn’t even know why – if anyone can defend himself, it’s Louis – but before he can tell himself not to, he steps forward so Louis is behind him and tells him to fuck off.

‘Got it.’ The pap laughs, taking another stutter of photos and when he stops to check the screen of his camera, he grins. ‘Thanks, _mate_ ,’ he says with a wink, swaggering off.

Zayn closes his eyes and sighs because that’s all he wanted and he shouldn’t have given it to him because tomorrow there’ll be a photo of him in _The Mirror_ under the caption _, Zayn Furious After Rebecca Row_ and his mother will call him in tears. He’s livid with himself, snatching his box of cigarettes out of the pocket of his trousers. His hands are shaking so much that it takes a couple of attempts to light one, but when he does, he inhales deeply and sighs the smoke out again, leaning against the wall they’re standing next to and tipping his head back. There are so many stars out that the sky kind of looks like static. Staring at it makes his eyes go out of focus for a second or two, before he blinks away a tear and realises that it’s nothing to do with the sky.

Louis doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t ask Zayn if he’s okay or thank him for defending him and Zayn hopes that’s because he knows that he doesn’t need to, rather than because he’s embarrassed that Zayn had to. He turns his head to look at him and Louis’ hands are in the pockets of his suit trousers, his gaze focused on a _Becks_ bottle cap that’s embedded in the road, and he knows it’s the latter, so he tries to make a joke.

‘Harry’ll be pissed,’ Zayn says with a small smile. ‘I guess I’m the Bad Boy.’

Louis laughs, sudden and bright, the skin around his eyes crinkling, and Zayn’s heart immediately doubles in size because Louis is one of only four other people in the world who gets that. Who remembers that afternoon, the five of them sitting on the beach near Simon’s house, tense and cross-legged, the sun making their shirts stick to their backs as they waited for someone to get them for their audition. ‘Why us?’ Zayn asked as he carved his initials into the sand with his finger as though he wanted it to remember him, at least until the tide reached out to rub them away. The others were quiet for a while and he should have been surprised that no one said, ‘Because we’re good.’ But they never would, not after they had to endure the humiliation of standing on that stage at bootcamp listening to Simon call out everyone’s name but theirs.

Louis said afterwards that it was the best thing that could have happened to them because it broke them before they even started. Zayn thought it was bullshit, that it was one of those things people say to console you, like rain being good luck on your wedding day. But Zayn realised what Louis meant that afternoon, as he carved his initials into the sand, because nothing will ever hurt as much as that, as much as waiting to hear his name and not. So he wasn’t surprised that it was Louis who was the first to say that it was because they were stronger together than they were apart.

‘I’m the funny one,’ he said with a smug nod.

Niall sat up and frowned. ‘Fuck off, Louis! Everyone knows the Irish are funny.’

‘Not as funny as me.’

Liam shook his head. ‘You’re the salt of the Earth northerner, Lou.’

‘Who are you, then?’

‘I’m the sensible one.’

No one disagreed.

Harry put his arms up and grinned. ‘Who am I?’

‘The cute one,’ they said in unison.

It was his turn to be put out. ‘I thought I was the Bad Boy?’

They turned to look at Zayn and he shook his head. ‘I’m the token ethnic.’

The others looked at each other, not sure what to say, but Louis laughed, big and loud, so loud that he blushed and covered his mouth with his hand. Zayn laughed, too, just as big and just as loud, because after weeks of worrying whether he had anything in common with any of them, he was relieved that Louis at least got his sense of humour. Then they were all laughing and Zayn finally felt it as he looked around at them sitting on the sand in their carefully coordinated outfits, felt the thread that connected them because no one – _no one_ – got what they were about to do and if it happened, it would happen to all of them. So, ten minutes later, when Louis hurt his ankle, they didn’t hesitate and refused to audition without him, even though he told them that they had to.

Louis’ still smiling to himself as he looks down at the bottle cap in the road and Zayn wonders if he’s thinking the same thing, about that moment by the pool when Simon told them that they were through and their whole lives rolled out in front of them like red carpets. Simon told them later that's why he gave them a chance, because when they wouldn’t audition without Louis, he knew they were band before they auditioned as one. So maybe Rebecca’s right, maybe it was luck that they ended up together, but it wasn’t luck that they stayed together.

 

+++

 

The first time Louis takes the cigarette from between his fingers, Zayn is so stunned that he just watches as Louis puts it between his lips and takes a pull. It’s not that Louis’ a prude, Zayn just thought that Louis was too sensible to smoke. Not sensible in the way Liam is, Louis doesn’t worry about stuff like going to bed early and can always be talked into one last drink, but it’s that knowing too much thing again. He’s solid. _Steady_. Even if he’s the last to go to bed, he’s still the first to get up the next morning and whether they’ve managed to persuade him to have one last drink or ten, he never oversleeps, never complains.

Zayn used to think that it was because he was the oldest, but it’s more than that. Doniya’s about his age but she doesn’t check the back door is locked before she goes to bed or puts the milk back in the fridge if someone leaves it on the kitchen counter. But that’s Louis. Drunk as he is, he still manages to grab Harry a second before he’s about to stack it down a flight of stairs and he’s always – _always_ – the first to throw himself into a fight if someone starts on one of them. But that’s who he was before – a big brother – and that’s who he’ll always be and that’s another thing they have in common.

‘You’ve been out here ages,’ Louis says, sitting on the lounger next to Zayn’s and he’s not asking if he’s okay, but he knows Louis well enough now to know that he is.

Zayn nods, putting a hand behind his head as he lies back on the lounger and looks at the swimming pool which is lit up like a neon sign. They’re at Simon’s house celebrating What Makes You Beautiful getting to number one and Zayn’s been lying there for twenty minutes, listening to the laughter spilling out from inside. There’s something kind of strange about listening to a party you should be at, something kind of lonely, like walking past a playground of children at break time. And he’s doing it to himself, he knows, because he should be in there with everyone else, getting drunk on champagne and sneaking into Simon’s bedroom with Harry to root through his wardrobe, but the whole day has been overwhelming. Actually, the last _year_ has been overwhelming. It feels like he hasn’t stopped for breath since he got to the front of the queue that drizzly morning in Manchester and someone gestured at him to step forward.

It’s going to stop. It has to stop. Things like this don’t happen to people like him. The last house party he went to was in a tiny three up, two down with a broken front gate and no carpet in the hall. He drank warm beer and got a knock back from a girl called Ali who had magnificent tits and a wicked smile and now he’s sitting by a pool in a pair of _Armani_ jeans with the taste of _Veuve Clicquot_ on his tongue.

It’s mad, but every time he thinks, _this is it_ it isn’t. He never thought he’d make it through to bootcamp, then he didn’t think they’d make it past Simon’s house, then the live shows. So when they didn’t win, he thought, _okay, this is it_ , but it wasn’t. It just keeps going on and on and on and he can’t catch his breath and he wishes – _wishes_ – that he could be like the other lads and just enjoy it. That he could wasted like Niall or walk into Simon’s house and say, ‘I’m going to have a house like this one day,’ like Liam, but his head’s been spinning all day and he just needs a minute, which is why he’s hiding by the pool. But of all the people to notice that he was gone, he didn’t think it would be Louis.

He reaches out to hand the cigarette back, but Zayn gestures at him to keep it. Louis looks down at it and it’s quiet for a moment – _too_ quiet, so quiet that Zayn can hear Harry and Niall singing That's Amore – so Zayn tries to make a joke.

‘A number one, eh? That has to be at least two gold stars at _McDonalds_.’

Louis’ shoulders fall and he laughs like he did that night with the pap last month – sudden and bright, the skin around his eyes crinkling. Then he looks up at Simon’s house and tells the story about the _Tesco_ sandwiches. Zayn must have heard it a dozen times, about how, when Louis was broke, he used to swap the reduced stickers on sandwiches at the supermarket. But Zayn doesn’t tell him that and lets him finish because he knows what he’s thinking. That it’s going to stop. That it has to stop.

When he finishes, Louis looks at the cigarette again.

‘I smoke.’ He lifts his chin to look at Zayn. ‘I’ve never told anyone that before.’

He frowns at him. ‘Since when?’

‘Since I was thirteen.

‘ _Thirteen_?’

‘Yep.’ He nods. ‘I stole a cigarette out of my Uncle Al’s pack and went and smoked it in the shed. I was sick afterwards. It’s still the naughtiest thing I’ve ever done.’

‘I’ve never seen you smoke, Lou.’

He shakes his head. ‘Oh I don’t let myself smoke.’

‘Why not?’

‘I dunno know.’ He shrugs, turning his hand to look at the tip of the cigarette as Zayn reaches into the pocket of his jeans for his pack and lights one. ‘I look at you and you look so content and I think, y’know, maybe I’ll have just one, but I know what I’m like. I can never have just one. That’s why I can’t be around you sometimes.’

Zayn smiles. ‘And I thought it was because you didn’t like me, Louis.’

‘Well.’ He tilts his head and smiles sweetly. ‘That, too.’

‘When did you stop?’

‘When I was sixteen. My Uncle Al had a heart attack.’

‘Shit.’ Zayn wriggles on the lounger. ‘Sorry.’

‘He’s alright.’ Louis shrugs. ‘He just had to give up. He was on sixty a day.’

‘ _Sixty_?’

‘Yep. Every photo we have of him, he has a fag in his hand.’ Louis stops to look down at the cigarette between his fingers. ‘He tried everything, the patches, the gum, everything. He even tried smoking rollies in the end because he thought it would make him smoke less, but it didn’t work, so he had to do it the hard way. It took him about a year, but he managed to wean himself off them until he was down to one a day.’ He holds the cigarette up. ‘But he just couldn’t give up that one cigarette.’

Louis puts it between his lips and takes another drag. His eyes water and Zayn doesn’t know if it’s because he’s enjoying it or he isn’t.

‘So every night at 9 o’clock,’ Louis goes on, jaw juddering as he exhales, ‘he makes himself a cup of tea and stands by the back door and smokes his one cigarette. He waits all day for it, counts the hours until he can smoke it. _Five hours until I can have a fag. Four hours until I can have a fag_. It’s the first thing he thinks when he wakes up in the morning. _Fourteen hours until I can have a fag_. And as soon as he’s smoked it, he starts counting again. _Twenty-three hours until I can have a fag_. Imagine that?’ He lifts his chin to look at Zayn. ‘Your whole life revolving around one cigarette?’

Zayn nods.

‘It’s his only moment of joy. Imagine needing something that much, Zayn?’ When he turns his cheek towards him, Louis is looking up at the house again. ‘Scary, isn’t it?’

It really is.

 

+++

 

It’s not something they’ve ever discussed – Zayn’s tattoos – which is strange given that Louis pounces on every opportunity to take the piss out of him, but when Zayn mentions that he’s going to get another one, Louis asks if he can go with him. Zayn is immediately suspicious, but Louis offers to drive, so he reluctantly agrees, but not before he makes Louis promise that he won’t pass comment on what he’s getting done.

Zayn doesn’t think for a minute that he’ll do as he’s told but, to his surprise, Louis just stands there, eyes wide, and doesn’t say a word. Not even when he’s done. Louis’ gaze flicks to the cling film around Zayn’s wrist every now and then as they drive home, but he doesn’t say a thing. (Unlike Harry who asks a barrage of breathless questions when he sees it. _What does it mean? Why’d you get it there? Does it hurt?_ and Zayn’s personal favourite _Can I touch it?_ as he prods it with his finger.)

So the next time Zayn gets a tattoo, he tells Louis and it kind of becomes their thing. They never do stuff just the two of them so Zayn’s surprised at how easy it is to spend time with him. When he’s on his own, Louis’ completely different. He’s quiet. Mellow, even. He’s still hilarious, but he says things with an easy smile, his eyes brighter when Zayn laughs, too. They go out for a drink afterwards, to the oldest, dodgiest pub they can find. An old man’s drinking pub, Zayn calls them, the sort of place that always has the football on and a St George’s flag hanging by the door.

Zayn would never go into a pub like that without Louis, but getting his head kicked in is worth the risk to have a drink in peace because no one would think to look for them there. They drink beer from proper pint glasses and eat bags of crisps and if it’s warm enough, they sit in the beer garden. Louis smokes sometimes and every time he does, Zayn thinks of his Uncle Al and his 9 o’clock cigarette and wonders if that’s Louis’, if he only does it when he’s with him. It surprises Zayn how much he wants it to be.

 

+++

 

Louis’ clearly curious about the tattoo thing. Zayn catches him staring sometimes if his shirt is unbuttoned just enough to see the curve of his grandfather’s name. Usually Zayn would be embarrassed if a guy stared at him like that, but it’s Louis so he doesn’t ask him what he’s looking at because if Louis wanted to say something, he would. But he never will because Louis’ a stubborn ass and he’ll never give Zayn the satisfaction of admitting that he wants to get a tattoo, not after being so vocal about not liking them.

They’re tacky, apparently. That’s what he said in the back of a cab once. They were all slightly worse for wear, Liam and Niall already asleep, their heads back and their mouths open, but Harry was _wasted_ and all of over Zayn, a hand in his shirt.

‘I’m getting a tattoo,’ he slurred, stroking the Arabic script curled under Zayn’s collarbone with his finger, but it sounded more like a threat than an announcement.

‘They’re fucking tacky, Haz.’ Louis rolled his eyes and Zayn tilted his head at him.

‘My grandfather’s name is tacky?’

‘Don’t be an asshole, Lou,’ Harry said, his hand curling around Zayn’s shoulder as he waited for Louis to apologise, but Louis never would – _never_ , especially when he was drunk – so Zayn didn’t hold his breath. But he did see Louis’ cheeks go from pink to red before he turned his face away and he knew that he was mortified.

Just like he knows that Louis will never admit to wanting a tattoo. Zayn would tease him about it, tell him it’s karma for being such a dickhead, but he doesn’t need to because Louis winds himself up about it. Like earlier, Zayn was wearing a tank top and it must have been low enough to expose the top of the playing card tattooed on his side and when Harry saw it, he gasped and tried to tug the arm hole down. Zayn had no idea he was so ticklish, yelping then giggling as he wriggled away from him and pressed his hand to his side to hide the tattoo. But that only made Harry more determined, and he climbed into Zayn’s lap, pinning him to the sofa as he tried to get a better look.

Louis must have heard them wrestling and walked to the back of the tour bus as Zayn grabbed Harry’s wrists and told him to leave him alone with a helpless giggle.

‘What are you doing, Haz?’ Louis asked with a frown.

Harry cackled, trying to bite one of Zayn’s hands so he let go of his wrist. ‘He won’t let me see his new tattoo.’

‘It isn’t new,’ Louis said with a surly sigh, taking Harry by the collar of his shirt and pulling him out of Zayn’s lap as though he was a naughty puppy. ‘It’s a month old.’

‘How come _you’ve_ seen it?’ Harry asked with a pout, but Louis ignored him and put his hands on Harry’s shoulders, pointing him towards his bunk.

Zayn chuckled softly as he watched them walk away, his hands on his stomach as he tried to catch his breath. He waited for Louis to look back, but he didn’t. He didn’t look at him for the rest of the day, in fact, not until Zayn was about to go to bed. Zayn thought he was the only one still awake so didn’t bother going into the bathroom to strip down to his underwear, but after he pulled off his t-shirt, he looked up to find Louis waiting to get past. The shock of it made Zayn step back, which made Louis do the same.

‘I was just.’ He held up an empty glass and nodded towards the kitchen.

‘Sorry,’ Zayn said, getting out of his way.

When he stepped aside, that should have been it, but as soon as he slid past him, Zayn turned back as Louis did and when their gaze met it made Zayn’s cheeks burn as he asked himself what Louis was looking at. But then that made his cheeks even hotter, because Zayn wouldn’t know that Louis had turned back if he hadn’t turned back as well.

 

+++

 

It’s been almost a year since their first trip to a tattoo parlour, but Louis finally admits it. ‘I like his sleeve. Is it Maori?’ he says, feigning nonchalance as he nods at the guy who’s about to do Zayn’s tattoo. He won’t look at him and Zayn is _itching_ to give him shit about it, but then Louis adds, ‘I could never get one somewhere that obvious, though.’

When he shrugs, Zayn realises why he’s so reluctant and it makes the edges of his heart soften a little. ‘You shouldn’t worry what other people think, Lou.’

‘My mum would kill me, though,’ he says, taking the folder of designs from the coffee table in front of them and flicking through it. He lingers on one of a stag, tracing it’s antlers with his finger before turning the page. ‘Like actually kill me dead.’

‘Why?’

‘She already has enough shit to deal with,’ he mutters, stopping to look at one of a swallow. ‘I’m supposed to be the one she doesn’t have to worry about any more.’

Zayn nods, his head dipping as he thinks of the last time he went home and he walked past his parents bedroom as his mother told his father that she’d be able to sleep that night. ‘I haven’t slept since he got on that plane to Marbella,’ she said with a weary sigh and she sounded so tired that Zayn couldn’t help but ask himself what he was doing.

‘It’s just a tattoo, Lou,’ he said, scratching the back of his head.

‘Yeah, but she’s already worried sick about what I’m doing on the road. She keeps telling me to be careful. I swear she thinks we’re throwing tellies out of windows and snorting coke off strippers' arses. Can you imagine if I got a tattoo?’

Zayn presses his hand to his stomach and laughs at the thought of Liam snorting coke off a stripper’s arse. He’d probably stop halfway through to ask if she was okay.

‘Yeah, but she’s your mum.’ He stops to wipe a tear away then chuckles as he thinks of Liam and the stripper again. ‘She’ll understand.’

‘And if she doesn’t?’

‘She will.’

‘Yeah but what if I get to eighty and it looks shit? I’m gonna regret it so much.’

‘If you get to eighty and your biggest regret is a tattoo then you're doing okay, Lou.’

‘You’re the wrong person to talk to about this.’ He closes the folder and sighs.

Zayn smiles. ‘So why are you talking to me, then?’

 

+++

 

Louis’ tattoo is tiny. So tiny that you probably wouldn’t notice it, but there it is, his first ink coloured act of defiance that, three weeks later, he still can’t stop looking at it.

‘Yes. Yes. It’s very nice, Lou,’ Zayn tells him, padding across the room to pick his jacket off the floor. He stops to yawn and he should go to bed, he knows, because they have to be up in about three hours, but it’s been one of those perfect, perfect days. The sun was out all day – loud and bright even though it’s October - and he’s just had a toe curlingly good shag with a Swedish girl called Rika so he won't sleep now, his whole body humming. Louis seems in no hurry to go to bed, either. He knocked on his door a few minutes after Rika left, vowing never to be in the room next to Zayn’s again.

‘My mum still hasn’t seen it,’ Louis says, bringing his bare foot up and resting it on the seat of the armchair he’s slouched in, then presses his finger to the cross on his ankle.

‘Isn’t that the point?’

‘I’m so rock and roll.’ Louis puts his foot down and grins. ‘Let’s throw a telly out the window.’

Zayn pretends to gasp. ‘But what would your mother say, Mr Tomlinson?’

His eyes widen. ‘I swear she knows.’

‘About the strippers?’

‘No, the tattoo.’

‘You’re just prang from all the coke, Lou.’

‘She always knows when I’ve done something bad.’

Zayn shakes his head, wishing that Louis didn’t think being himself was being bad. But then he hid his first tattoo from his mother for three months. In the end, it was Waliyha who grassed him up when he wouldn’t buy her a pair of _Uggs_.

‘Let’s do the stripper thing, then.’ Louis waggles his eyebrows, his smile widening as Zayn finds the tin in the inside pocket of his jacket and walks back towards him.

Zayn sits on the sofa and puts it on the coffee table and he would usually be more discrete. He’s only ever smoked in front of Harry before, but the other lads know he puffs and while it’s not something he parades in front of them, it isn’t something he’s ashamed of, either. At least his hotel rooms are bigger now. He remembers when he had to smoke in the bathroom or roll a towel and put it against the door in case Paul smelt it. Besides, it’s Louis. They’re discussing snorting coke off a stripper’s arse; weed’s nothing.

‘Do you want me to go?’ Louis asks when Zayn opens the tin.

‘Do you want to go?’

Louis doesn’t move so Zayn carries on, digging around in the tin for his roach book then gives up when he remembers that he used the last one yesterday.

‘Do you want a drink?’ Louis asks, getting up and walking over to the mini bar.

‘Nah. I’m alright,’ Zayn says, tearing a strip off the _Rizla_ packet and rolling it between his index finger and thumb.

Louis grabs a beer and when he sits in the armchair again, Zayn’s shoulders tense, but he just drinks it quietly, so after a few moments, he forgets he’s there. And he’s glad because Zayn enjoys skinning up as much as smoking, he thinks. He enjoys the alchemy of rolling a joint, of getting the balance right so there’s not too much tobacco and making sure that he rolls it so it’s tight, but not too tight that it burns too slow. But most of all he likes not having to think about anything, about what time he has to be up in the morning and what they’re doing the next day and if he remembered to call his mother and if he has enough cigarettes and all the other things he thinks about for the other twenty-three hours and forty-five minutes of the day. And it’s nice to feel like he’s good at something, like he knows what he’s doing. The first joint he rolled was a mess, loose and untidy, while the roach was so tight it hurt his head to inhale. And it took him about twenty minutes to roll because he was all fingers and thumbs, but now he’s got it down to a fine art and with a few flicks of his fingers and one final lick, it’s done.

‘Can I have some?’ Louis asks as soon as Zayn lights it.

Zayn shakes his head as he takes a pull and holds it in for as long as he can, until everything around him starts to soften slightly, then he lets go of it with a sigh.

‘Come on.’

‘No.’

‘Please, Zayn.’

‘Nope.’

‘I’ve done it before.’

‘Good for you.’

‘Why not?’

‘The tattoo’s bad enough.’ Zayn takes another pull and tips his head back. He blows a string of smoke rings at the ceiling then lets his head keep tipping back until it hits the back of the sofa. ‘I’m not going to be responsible for your descent into drugs as well.’

‘If I can roll one can I smoke it?’

Zayn lifts his head to arch an eyebrow at him. ‘Alright.’

This he has to see.

Louis smiles smugly as Zayn opens his legs and sinks down into the sofa so he can keep his head on the cushion and still see what he’s doing. Louis takes what he needs out of the tin with such confidence, Zayn knows that he’s done it before. He shouldn’t be surprised, but he is and he wonders if they might have been friends after all, if they weren’t here, in this hotel room, in this band. He thinks of sixteen-year old Louis who used to smoke cigarettes in the shed before his uncle had a heart attack and wonders what would have happened if they’d met at a party. Louis probably would have taken the piss out of his Jay-Z t-shirt and Zayn would definitely have despaired of his floppy hair, but maybe they would have ended up in a corner somewhere, standing a little too close and their fingers touching as they passed a joint back and forth.

‘Ta da!’ Louis holds it up proudly.

‘Learn that from your uncle?’

‘Yeah.’ Louis blinks at him. ‘How did you know?’

‘You forgot to add the weed,’ Zayn tells him with a wink.

Louis throws his head back and laughs, then slaps his forehead with his hand.

Zayn sits up, reaching over the coffee table to ruffle his hair because he’s never seen Louis like that, all silly and adorable, his cheeks pink.

‘Here,’ he says with a slow smile, handing Louis the joint, his hand shaking suddenly when the tips of their fingers touch. ‘Take it easy.’

Louis nods, but he doesn’t and inhales too quick and too deep and starts spluttering, smoke coming out of his nose and mouth at once.

Zayn rolls his eyes. ‘Alright, Cheech.’ He stands up and reaches over the coffee table, slapping him on the back and taking the joint from him. ‘That’s your lot.’

‘I’m okay,’ Louis starts to say, holding his hand up, then coughs hysterically, his face red. Zayn rolls his eyes again and walks over to the mini bar, taking out a bottle of water then hitting Louis on the back of the head with it.

‘I thought you’d done it before?’

‘I have,’ Louis rasps, his voice _ruined_. ‘But not since I met you lot.’

‘You’re supposed to start doing drugs _after_ you join a band, Lou.’

He laughs, slow and dizzy, then laughs again when he tries to drink some water and misses, spilling it down his t-shirt. ‘Oops,’ he says, throwing his head back and cackling. ‘Oops. Who came up with that? _Oops_. What a stupid fucking word. _Oops_. _Oops_.’

‘Fuc _king_ hell.’ Zayn sighs, sitting back on the sofa. ‘How much did you inhale?’

Louis thinks about it as he gulps some water, then says, ‘I can’t feel my face.’

Zayn laughs so hard that he falls back against the sofa, his feet leaving the floor as he holds his stomach. And it’s not even that funny, but it’s Louis, mardy, sarcastic Louis who’d _annihilate_ him if he said something like that, and it’s fucking glorious.

‘I can’t breathe,’ Zayn says, gasping for air as Louis’ phone starts ringing and he takes it out of his pocket and looks at the screen.

‘Shit, it’s my mum!’ He screams – actually screams – throwing the phone across the room. It hits the edge of the bed and bounces, landing screen down onto the Persian rug in the middle of the room. ‘How does she know? She’s a witch!’

Louis stares at him, his lips parted, and Zayn loses it, almost burning the sofa with the joint as he rolls onto his side, clutching his stomach. He lies there for a few moments, tears in his eyes as his head swims blissfully. He hasn’t felt that in such a long time, that warmth in his blood and slackness in his muscles. He’s happy, he realises, and the thought is like hearing a song he used to love on the radio and hasn’t heard for years.

‘Hey, Lou,’ he says, pressing his cheek to the sofa and looking at him.

‘Yeah?’

‘You alright?’

Louis considers it for a moment, then grins helplessly. ‘You know what?’ He lowers his voice and leans forward as though he’s telling Zayn a secret. ‘I think I am.’

 

+++

 

Louis’ good mood doesn’t last. The next day he’s in a foul one. He’s the last on the bus, complaining that he didn’t have time for breakfast then making a show of spitting out the cup of tea Liam makes him asking how people in Sweden survive on _that shit_.

Zayn leaves him the fuck to it, retreating to his bunk to call his mother because he knows it’ll end up being his fault for keeping him up until 4 a.m.

‘He’ll be alright once he has something to eat,’ Harry says as he crawls up into his bunk, even though Zayn didn’t ask. But Louis isn’t. His mood continues for the rest of the day and normally Zayn would ignore him, but he knows Louis well enough now to know that it’s more than lack of sleep. This isn’t one of his infamous strops, he isn’t being bitchy and biting and rolling his eyes at everything everyone says. He’s angry, so angry he can’t speak, his jaw clenching and unclenching all day like he wants to say something and can’t.

‘I’m fine,’ he keeps saying – I’m fine. I’m fine. I’m fine. I’m fine – and it’s driving Zayn _fucking nuts_ because he clearly isn’t so he wishes everyone would just leave him the fuck alone until he got over it. He’d probably get over it a lot quicker if he didn’t have to keep telling Liam that he was fine every thirty seconds.

Zayn knows that Louis is going to snap, but he’s surprised that he doesn’t do it until after the show, when they’re walking from the bus to the hotel. It’s chaos, as usual, a rush of screams and shoves, hands grabbing at him from all directions so Zayn isn’t sure if he’s being pulled away from the crowd or into it. There’s a hand on his right arm and the grip is so steady, he’s sure it’s Paul, but then he feels a sharp pain and winces. He’s about to tell him to go easy when Paul appears in front of him and reaches for his left hand. Startled, Zayn turns back to look down at the hand clutching his right arm to see red fingernails and tries to pull away. But the girl won’t let go and when he tries to jerk his arm away again, he feels a sudden, sharp pain that makes him yelp.

Then Louis is between them.

‘Let go!’ he spits, grabbing the girl’s wrist. But she isn’t listening, pulling Zayn backwards and trying to kiss his cheek as she tells him that she loves him.

‘Fucking let go of him!’ Louis tells her, but when he tugs at her wrist again, she sinks her nails into Zayn’s arm and it makes his eyes swim out of focus for a second.

Zayn doesn’t know what happens after that as all hell breaks lose. He can hear Louis swearing at the girl, but then he’s gone and he looks up to see Jag pulling him towards the entrance to the hotel. Then Paul grabs Zayn and it’s like the parting of the Red Sea as Paul holds his arm out and bellows at everyone to move.

When they get through the revolving doors and in the lobby, Zayn’s out of breath. He’s lost his baseball cap in the scuffle and presses a hand to the top of his unwashed hair as there’s another flurry of camera flashes as Paul leads him to the lifts.

Zayn hears Harry before he sees him and he’s never heard him raise his voice like that – at least not in public, where anyone can hear – and when they turn the corner, he and Louis are arguing in front of the lifts.

‘You can’t talk to a fan like that, Lou!’ Harry says, a hand in his hair.

‘You always fucking do this, Harry!’ Louis barks, and as soon as Paul lets go of him, Zayn steps forward, sure that he’s going to punch him, but Liam’s there.

‘Come on, guys.’

Louis shakes his head. ‘No, Liam. He always does this!’

‘Do _what_ , Louis?’

‘Stick up for everyone else because you want everyone to like you!’

‘The fuck?’ Harry looks stunned. ‘She’s a kid! She got a bit excited!’

‘ _A bit excited_?’ Louis grabs Zayn's wrist and shows Harry his arm. ‘Look!’

Harry’s face changes as he looks down at the tangle of livid scratches on Zayn’s arm. ‘Shit, man. Are you alright?’

Liam asks him as well, a hand on his shoulder, but Zayn isn’t listening as he looks at his arm. He didn’t know it was that bad, his head swimming suddenly and his mouth flooding with the taste of dirty pennies when he sees the blood.

‘Who’s sticking up for us?’ Louis says, looking at Harry, then at Liam and Niall. ‘No one gives a shit about us. They only care that we’re not late for our next appearance.’

Paul shakes his head. ‘Come on, Lou. That isn’t true.’

Louis turns to stare at him, his eyes wet. ‘What if she had a knife?’ When Paul looks away, he looks at Harry again. ‘Is this fucking worth it?’

He doesn’t say anything, just looks at his feet, and Louis curses under his breath.

‘Leave him,’ Zayn says, pressing his hand to Liam’s chest when Louis storms over to the door to the stairs and kicks it open. ‘Let him calm down.’

 

+++

 

They spend the rest of the evening in their rooms and he can’t remember the last time they did that. Usually they would have ignored Louis’ mood and gone out anyway, but they each peel off to their rooms to order room service and call home.

Harry ends up in Zayn's room, the pair of them slouched on the sofa watching a Ryan Gosling film that neither of them are paying any attention to.

‘How’s your arm?’ Harry asks, looking down at the bandage wrapped around his right forearm, covering his _ZAP!_ tattoo.

‘It’s alright.’

‘Does it hurt?’

‘Not really.’

‘So you don’t, like, need anything to help soothe the pain?’

Zayn turns his head to look at Harry, then sighs. ‘Go get the tin.’

Harry jumps up. He knows exactly where it is and when he gives it to Zayn, he throws himself on the sofa again, babbling about Louis quitting the band and what they’re going to do and by the time Zayn is done skinning up, he wants to punch him.

‘What’s the first rule, Harry?’

‘No talking while smoking.’ He rolls his eyes then sits up when Zayn puts the joint between his lips. ‘No. Me! Me first!’

‘What’s the second rule, Harry?’

‘Roller gets first puff.' His shoulders slump. 'But I’m really stressed.’

‘I was maimed today,’ Zayn reminds him, reaching for his lighter.

‘Yeah, but what if Louis quits and the band breaks up and I have to go back to working in the bakery and-’

Zayn interrupts him with a sigh. ‘If I give you a blow back will you shut the fuck up?’

‘Yes.’ Harry claps his hands.

‘When are you going to learn to puff like a grown up?’

‘Never,’ Harry grins, his eyes lighting up as he watches Zayn light the joint.

Zayn inhales then turns towards him as Harry does the same. Their faces meet, noses almost touching, but not quite, and when Zayn exhales slowly, Harry inhales the smoke until he sighs and his eyelashes flutter shut.

‘One more,’ he breathes, his eyes still shut, reaching for Zayn’s elbow when he turns his face away. Zayn obliges and Harry sighs happily, sinking back into the sofa.

Zayn does the same, his head falling back on the sofa cushion as he looks up at the perfect white ceiling, the coving around the edges like icing on a wedding cake.

‘You try.’ Harry nudges him with his knee. ‘You’re the only one who hasn’t.’

‘Try what?’

‘To talk to Louis.’

Zayn chuckles and rubs his stomach with his hand. ‘He hasn’t opened the door to anyone. Why the fuck would he open the door to me?’

‘Because he likes you.’

‘He likes you and he didn’t open the door to you.’

‘You’re good with him, though. You don’t put up with his crap.’

Zayn nods, taking another toke and sighing the smoke back out again.

‘Go on.’ Harry nudges him again. ‘Now you’ve had some Dutch Courage.’ He sniggers, thrilled with himself. ‘Get it? Dutch Courage. _Amsterdam_.’

‘You know most weed comes from North Africa, right?’

‘North African Courage?’ Harry shakes his head. ‘That’s not funny.’

 

+++

 

Harry has to all but shove him off the sofa, but Zayn eventually knocks on the door to Louis’ room. It’s almost 2 a.m. and he hopes that’s enough time for him to have calmed down but his knock is met with a, ‘Fuck off!’

He’s about to give up when he looks up to find Harry in the doorway to his room, gesturing at him to knock again. He does. ‘It’s me,’ Zayn tells him with a weary sigh and Louis ignores him, but as Zayn turns to Harry to say, _See?_ the door opens.

Zayn’s heart stops, immediately killing his buzz as they look at one another. He really didn’t think that Louis would open the door so has no idea what to say. But then Louis leans against the door and looks at him from under his eyelashes.

‘How’s your arm?’

‘Alright.’

‘Is it gonna leave a scar?’

Zayn blinks and looks at the bandage. It didn’t occur to him to ask. ‘I dunno.’

‘I’m fine, by the way,’ he says, turning and walking into the room.

That surprises Zayn as well, so he doesn’t suggest otherwise, just follows him in and tosses his cigarette pack at him. Louis seems relieved, sitting on the sofa and opening it, taking the neon plastic lighter out of the box and looking at it.

‘It’s nothing,’ he says with a defeated sigh, looking up at Zayn as he collapses into the armchair and puts his feet on the coffee table between them. Louis sighs again, then lights a cigarette, his cheeks hollowing as he takes a long pull on it. He closes his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose as he exhales. ‘It’s nothing.’

‘Okay,’ Zayn says, catching the cigarette box when Louis tosses it back.

‘Daisy twisted her ankle.’

Zayn frowns. ‘Is she alright?’

‘Yeah. She fell off the swing.’ He takes another drag on the cigarette then takes his beanie off and smoothes his hair down with his hand before tugging it back on again. ‘But she was inconsolable and wouldn’t go to the hospital until Mum called me.’ He brings the cigarette to his lips again, then stops. ‘She wouldn’t stop crying. She kept telling me to come home. _Lou Lou, come home. Come home_. And what the fuck do I tell her? _Sorry, Daise, I can’t come home. I’ve got to do Dancing with the Stars tomorrow_.’

‘Tell Paul.’

‘I did. _Modest!_ said it wasn’t urgent and it can wait until we go home on Sunday.’

Zayn shakes his head as he takes out a cigarette and taps it twice on the box.

Louis is quiet for a moment or two, then he sighs again. ‘This is the best and the worst thing that has ever happened to me.’

Zayn taps the cigarette on the box again as he wonders what Harry would say if he was there. Probably something about how lucky they are and how amazing all of this is, which it is, but Zayn doesn’t say anything, just sighs and lights the cigarette.

This is why people shouldn’t talk to him.

 

+++

 

Some time off helps. It’s only a few days, but it’s enough to put the colour back in Louis’ cheeks. He’s back to his usual self, mucking around with Harry for the entire flight to LA and getting on everyone’s nerves. Normally, it would get on Zayn’s nerves as well, but when he hears the guy sitting behind him complain to one of the cabin crew that he bought a first class ticket to LA, not dinner at _Chuck E. Cheese_ , Zayn makes sure he keeps his seat back for the rest of the flight.

He can’t believe that he’s actually missed Louis, the annoying, grumpy bastard. They don’t talk, though, not until an hour before they land, when he sinks into the seat next to Zayn’s with a smirk. ‘Did you just join the Mile High Club, Mr Malik?’

Louis waggles his eyebrows at him then looks over at the flight attendant who’s on the other side of the cabin, handing Niall a white china mug of tea. Zayn didn’t think anyone had noticed so his cheeks flush, but he declines to comment, hiding his smile behind his hand as he realises she and Louis have the same colour hair.

He tries to change the subject.

‘How’s Daisy?’

Louis rolls his eyes. ‘Fine. Running around like nothing happened.’

‘She’s as tough as her big brother,’ Zayn tells him, mirroring him and sinking down into the seat, his hands on his stomach.

‘They’re getting so big.’

‘Safaa likes a boy at school.’

Louis turns to look at him, an eyebrow raised. ‘Oh really?’

‘His name’s Luke and he has Harry hair-’

‘Harry hair?’ Louis interrupts, looking over at Harry who’s eating a grape and chuckling at whatever film he’s watching. ‘That’s a thing now? ‘Cos it shouldn’t be.’

‘That’s what she said, _Harry hair_. And he supports Chelsea.’

‘Well, he’s a twat.’ Louis sneers. ‘We need to have a word.’

‘I tried, but she loves him.’

Zayn bats his eyelashes and Louis groans. ‘So it begins.’

‘How are we going to kick all these boys’ arses if we’re on the road all the time?’

‘You only have three sisters to deal with. I have _five_. It’s fucking exhausting.’

‘I wish we could press a button when we go home,’ Zayn says, looking up at the smooth curve of the cabin, ‘so it stays that way until we go back.’

‘Mum’s painted the living room. It doesn’t even smell like home any more.’

‘Waliyha sleeps in my room now. I couldn’t wait to move out,’ Zayn says with a chuckle. ‘But I went into the bathroom and cried when I saw all my stuff in boxes.’

Louis nods. ‘I don’t know why, but I thought they’d wait.’

 

+++

 

They get a day off in LA before they have to fly to New York and Zayn couldn’t be happier because he adores LA. The other lads can’t wait to get to New York, but if Zayn could live anywhere, he’d live in LA. He loves Bradford, of course – it will always be home – but it’s so claustrophobic. Everything is packed together so tightly, all the houses stuck together in rows – rows and rows of them, like plastic chairs at a stadium – but LA is so open. It’s big and loud and bolshy with its long, wide roads and billboards, that he couldn’t help but be overwhelmed by it the first time they went there. Plus, it’s so _bright_. Everything bleached white or neon pink, like it isn’t even a real place, like it should be in a cartoon or something. Somewhere Lichtenstein would paint.

That’s the best word Zayn can think to describe it: _unreal_. The best bit is that no one has a fucking clue who they are, so he and Harry wander around _Amoeba_ with armfuls of CDs without having to stop and sign anything and no one lifts their head when they walk into _Roscoe's Chicken and Waffles_. It really is the perfect day, so when they pass a tattoo place on the way back to the hotel, Zayn lets Harry pull him in.

Several hours – and a couple of tattoos – later they’re in Zayn’s hotel room, comparing their new ink, when Louis knocks.

‘Thought I heard you,’ he says with a frown when Zayn opens the door. ‘Where the fuck have you been? You’ve been gone all day.’

‘Every-fucking-where,’ Zayn says with a weary sigh, gesturing at him to come in.

He does, but when he sees Harry on the sofa, the crease between his eyebrows deepens. ‘Hey, Haz.’

‘Lou! How was Venice Beach?’ Harry grins. ‘Show me your white bits!’

Louis blinks at him. ‘Are you guys drunk?’

Zayn rolls his eyes and sits next to Harry on the sofa. ‘He is.’

‘Am not,’ he pouts, then stage whispers at Louis. ‘I am a bit. We went to Chateau Marmont and I had two beers.’ He holds up two fingers.

‘Four,’ Zayn corrects.

Harry holds up three fingers. ‘ _Four_ beers. And we saw Lindsay Lohan!’

He laughs and Louis looks bewildered. He starts to say something, then stops, and when Zayn looks up, Louis is looking at the cling film wrapped around his hand.

‘Did you get a new tattoo?’

‘Yeah,’ Zayn says with a sniff, instinctively covering it with his other hand. ‘Just a little one.’

‘I got one, too.’ Harry jumps up and pulls up his shirt, twisting to show Louis  the new tattoo on his side. ‘I got a cage so he got a bird.’

Louis looks at Harry then at Zayn. ‘Oh really?’

‘Don’t say it like that, Harry.’ Zayn frowns. ‘I got a bird and you _happened_ to get a cage, the two things aren’t connected.’

‘Yeah, yeah,’ Harry says, walking over to Louis to give him a better look.

Louis isn’t interested in the slightest so Harry gives up and wanders over to the bed. The look on Louis’ face makes Zayn’s stomach twist.

‘It’s the swallow we saw in that folder-’ he explains, then stops because Louis isn’t listening as he watches Harry root through Zayn’s jacket and take out his tin.

‘You know what today is missing?’ he holds it up with a grin.

Louis looks ready to keel over. ‘You puff?’

‘God no.’ Harry scoffs, sitting next to Zayn on the sofa. ‘It kills my throat so he has to give me a blow back, because I’m a fourteen-year old girl, apparently.’

Zayn nods. ‘He really is.’

‘Remember the first time?’ Harry throws his head back and laughs, then turns to Louis, who’s still standing, watching them with his hands in the pockets of his hoodie. ‘I was on my knees and I don’t know what happened, whether I inhaled too quick or he rolled it too strong, but he did it and I literally keeled over onto my side and passed out. Timber!’

Zayn rolls his eyes, plucking a paper out of the _Rizla_ pack. ‘I thought I killed you.’

‘I was out for, like, eight hours straight. Slept right there on the floor.’

‘I had to pour water on his face to wake him up.’

‘That’s how I got that bruise, remember, Lou?’ He points to his forehead.

Louis nods. ‘I remember.’

‘At least we don’t have to put a towel against the door any more.’

Zayn laughs suddenly, almost tipping the contents of the joint onto the coffee table. ‘What was the name of that shitty hotel in Sheffield?’

‘Oh God yeah, that old lady!’

‘Are you boys smoking drugs?’ they say in unison, then fall apart laughing.

‘I’m gonna go,’ Louis says when they come up for air.

Harry gasps. ‘No! Stay. We just ordered room service.’

As if on cue, there’s a knock on the door and Harry jumps to his feet. ‘See!’

‘I’d better get it. I need to sign for it, don’t I?’ Zayn mutters, grabbing a magazine from the shelf under the coffee table and opening it to cover what he’s doing.

When he walks towards the door, Harry goes over to Louis and wraps his arms around him. ‘Please don’t be grumpy, Lou.’

‘I’m not. I’m just tired.’

‘We ordered tea,’ Zayn says with a smile, wheeling in the trolley.

‘And cheeseburgers.’

Zayn lifts the cloche off one of the plates. ‘And cheeseburgers.’

Harry doesn’t let go until Louis agrees to stay with a reluctant sigh. He has a face like a smacked arse so Zayn considers telling him not to bother if he’s gonna sulk, but it’s Louis and if he really wanted to go, he’d go. Hopefully a cup of tea will help.

Harry must be thinking the same thing, because he pours him one, stuffing a handful of chips in his mouth as Zayn finishes skinning up.

‘Oi!’ He points at Zayn when he lights the joint. ‘Me first!’

‘No. Roller gets first puff.’

‘No.’ He gives Louis the tea then throws himself on the sofa next to Zayn. ‘Me.’

‘You still have a mouthful of fucking chips.’

‘Oh yeah,’ he giggles, spitting them everywhere.

‘You’re disgusting.’

Zayn takes a pull and when he exhales, he holds his arm out to Louis, who shakes his head and sips his tea.

‘Have a blow back, Lou. They’re fun.’ Harry wipes his mouth with the back of his hand then turns to Zayn with a smirk. ‘Give me a proper one. Like the first time.’

Zayn nods, taking a long pull. Harry knows to take the joint from him as Zayn holds in the breath and cups his hands tightly around Harry’s nose and mouth. By the time he opens his fingers slightly, his lungs are ready to explode, so it’s with some effort that he exhales slowly, blowing the smoke through the gap in his fingers. Harry’s chest comes up to meet his elbows as he inhales, then exhales with a sigh that Zayn feels against his palms.

Zayn watches Harry’s eyelashes flutter then slow as his shoulders fall, but when he moves his hands away from his mouth, Harry grabs his wrist.

‘One more,’ he says with a sleepy smile and Zayn obliges.

‘I’m gonna go,’ Louis says when Zayn and Harry pull apart.

‘No.’ Harry frowns, his voice slower. _Rougher_. ‘Stay.’

But Zayn’s had enough. ‘Oh let him go if he wants to go.’

Zayn waves his hand, tossing Louis a filthy look, which earns him a filthier one.

‘I don’t want to interrupt.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ They stare at one another and when Louis doesn’t respond, Zayn tilts his head at him. ‘Come on, Lou. This isn’t like you. Spit it out.’

He doesn’t, turning his face away, and it’s moments like that, when Louis is being a sullen, stroppy shit, that Zayn’s sure that they’ll never find their middle ground. Not because there isn’t any, but because Louis won’t let him find it.

‘Whatever, Louis. Fuck off then.’

‘Hey,’ Harry says sleepily, holding his arms out. ‘Guys, chill.’

‘No.’ Zayn shakes his head as Louis strides over to the door. ‘Fuck him. I’ve had a brilliant day, I’m not having him ruin it with one of his moods.’

But when Louis slams the door behind him he already has.

 

+++

 

The next day it’s Zayn’s turn to be in a foul mood. He doesn’t look at Louis once on the way to the airport, just puts on his headphones and lets his head tip against the window. As he watches the palm trees flick past, he realises why he likes LA so much, because it kind of reminds him of Marbella, of getting there as one person and leaving as another. His chest suddenly feels a little warmer at the memory and he can’t help but think of Louis, of the tears in his eyes as the producer helped him towards the cab when he hurt his ankle. But he wouldn’t get in, reaching for the front of Zayn’s shirt and gasping in pain as he turned to press his mouth to Zayn’s ear. ‘Don’t let them wait for me,’ he said, his breath hot and too quick against Zayn’s ear. ‘Don’t let them fuck this up for me.’

Zayn nodded, but as soon as the cab pulled away and one of the producers tried to usher them into Simon’s house, Zayn shook his head.

‘You have to do it now, boys,’ she said, hands on her hips. ‘Simon can’t wait. He’s got to catch a flight back to London in a couple of hours.’

‘I’m not doing it without Louis.’

Liam stared at him like he was mad and Zayn shook his head again. ‘It’s not fair.’

The producer shrugged. ‘It’s unfortunate, Zayn, but these things happen.’

‘I’m not doing it without Louis.’

He looked at Harry and he shook his head as well. ‘Me, either.’

Liam reached for his arm and squeezed. ‘Zayn, what are you doing?’

Zayn looked around at them, standing in a circle in Simon’s driveway, and they all looked so scared. He was, too, but he couldn’t do it. It wasn’t right.

‘Remember?’ he said, frowning at them. ‘Remember what it was like, standing on that stage waiting for Simon to say your name and he didn’t?’ They looked at each other. ‘How can we do that to him again?’ Zayn points towards the black iron gates that are closing slowly. ‘We _all_ got a second chance that day. Louis deserves his, too.’

Liam nodded, turning to look at Niall. ‘He’s right. This is our first test as a band. Are we going to screw Louis over before we’ve even started?’

They didn’t and Zayn feels the edges of his mood soften as he thinks about it and he gets it then, why Louis got his first tattoo on his ankle. He didn’t ask because Louis never asks him and that’s when it hits him, why Louis’ so pissed off. He thought it was because he and Harry were being drunk and obnoxious, but it isn’t at all.

‘It wasn’t planned,’ Zayn says as they’re clambering out of the people carrier.

‘What wasn’t?’ Louis asks with a sullen sigh, lifting his chin in the air.

‘The tattoo thing. We just happened to walk past and went in.’

Louis lifts his chin a little higher. ‘I don’t care.’

Zayn nudges him with his hip then leans in. ‘I thought about you the whole time,’ he says, lowering his voice so only Louis will hear. When he does, Louis smiles – big and kind of clumsy – and it makes Zayn smile too as he asks himself if maybe he does care.

 

+++

 

That night, it’s just the two of them again. They’re sitting in Zayn’s room, listening to The Weeknd. Normally Louis would remark on it, snatch his iPod out of the dock and scroll through it until he finds something he likes, but he doesn’t say a word. The weed is helping, Zayn’s sure, and after all the shit last night, it’s _so nice_ , like those few moments of stillness after it’s rained. Louis’ just _there_ and it’s exactly what Zayn needs, the company. Louis isn’t crawling all over him like Harry would be, demanding a blow back as he picks the tomatoes out of his cheeseburger, and Louis isn’t asking him what he’s thinking about like his girlfriends do. _What you thinking, Zayn? What you thinking, Zayn? What you thinking, Zayn?_

Fuck all, that’s the point.

Eventually, the music slows to a throb that keeps time with his heart, or his heart keeps time with it, he isn’t sure. He just knows that it’s quiet. So quiet. No one is saying his name or grabbing at him and holding on tight enough to leave a mark. There are no lights to blink into, no lyrics to remember. He doesn’t have to do a fucking thing, just sit there while his muscles uncoil, burning like incense and collapsing into soft piles under his skin. And with that his world slows to nothing. Everything around him – the bed, the armoire, the oval coffee table Louis has his feet on – suddenly isn’t as sharp, as though if he reached out to touch them, they wouldn’t be there. Then everything is still and oh yes, there it is. He’s sinking – sinking, sinking – like a penny to the bottom of a fountain.

‘You want some?’ Zayn holds his arm out, but when Louis doesn’t respond, he forces himself to lift his head off the sofa to look at him. ‘What?’

Louis doesn’t say anything, just picks at the label on his beer bottle. It takes Zayn a moment or two to take the hint then the thought skids into his head, sudden and mischievous, like a streaker running across a football pitch.

‘You want a blow back?’ Zayn asks with a long lick of his lips.

Louis doesn’t look up, just shrugs and carries on furiously picking at the label. There’s something about it, about the way Louis won’t look at him, about the way his cheeks are so pink and his fingers are so restless, that makes something in Zayn’s stomach stir as Louis rubs his lips together. Zayn thinks about Louis’ mouth sometimes. Okay, a lot – probably because he’s always running it off – but there’s something about that, too, about the way Louis rubs his lips together that makes Zayn get to his feet.

Louis looks up as he does, his hand stilling as he watches Zayn walk over to the armchair he’s sitting in. Zayn takes the beer bottle from him and puts it on the coffee table then stops and looks down at him. Louis’ eyes are suddenly huge, his pupils blowing black as his hands curl around the arms of the chair, and Zayn’s never seen him like that before. Scared, maybe. Nervous, definitely, if the stunned stutter of his eyelashes is anything to go by. So Zayn can’t help but wonder what else he can make Louis feel as he puts the joint between his lips and lowers himself into his lap.

Zayn makes a show of it, he won’t lie, one corner of his mouth tipping up into a smile as his knees slide in on either side of Louis’ hips. And it’s not like it is with Harry, there’s no grabbing, no fight for space. But that’s the point – it not like it is with Harry – and Zayn doesn’t want it to be because he doesn’t want what he has with Harry with Louis and he doesn’t want what he has with Louis with Harry. He doesn’t want what he has with Louis with _anyone_ because when Louis looks at him, he sees it all. He doesn’t just see who Zayn is, but he sees who he’s trying to be and the gulf between the two. But more than that, he remembers who he was, Zain with an i who was too scared to dance and carved his initials into a Marbella beach because he wanted it to remember him. And Zayn sees it, too, the Louis who said goodbye to them all before he got in that cab to the hospital because he didn’t think he’d seen them again and still doesn’t know why he did. And there it is, at last, their middle ground, because Zayn gets that, he gets the agony of not knowing who you are yet but knowing that it’s not enough.

There isn’t enough room for the two of them on the armchair, but that’s the point, Zayn’s hips rolling forward as he sits in Louis’ lap. He hears the breath catch in Louis’ throat as he reaches for the back of the chair, his hands on either side of Louis’ head as he dips his chin to look down at him. Louis meets his gaze, his hands moving to Zayn’s hips, holding them and bringing them forward as if those few inches between them is too much. That makes Zayn’s breath catch in his throat, and he has to take the joint from between his lips, the smoke stinging his eyes.

‘Inhale and hold it in for as long as you can,’ he breathes. ‘Try not to cough.’

Louis nods as Zayn leans down, sucking in a quick breath as Zayn curls his hand around the back of his neck. He holds him still, his thumb resting on his throat so he can feel Louis’ heart banging. It makes Zayn lose time with his breath for a second so he keeps his thumb there while he tries to catch his breath, but Louis’ heart is beating so hard that Zayn doesn’t think he ever will as he sweeps his thumb across Louis’ throat.

‘Ready?’

Louis nods again and Zayn feels him gulp as he puts the joint between his lips and inhales deeply. He holds it for a moment then gives into the weight of his head, letting it fall forward until the tips of their noses are touching. Zayn squeezes the back of his neck with his hand so Louis knows it’s time, then exhales slowly.

Louis’ chest rises, coming up to meet his as he inhales, and Zayn feels the bang of his heart against his chest this time, like a tree branch knocking against a window on a windy day. Zayn tries to count each knock, but it isn’t until Louis reaches between them to press his hand to Zayn’s chest that he realises it isn’t Louis’ heart he’s feeling, it’s his own, throbbing through him as he lifts his chin to watch Louis’ eyelashes bat groggily.

‘You okay?’ Zayn breathes, squeezing the back of his neck with his hand again as his head tips forward so their foreheads are touching again.

Louis sucks in a breath, but as he does, their lips touch and Zayn’s pretty sure it’s an accident, but then Louis lifts his chin so his bottom lip catches on Zayn’s top lip and that’s definitely not an accident. The shock of it makes Zayn press his thumb into Louis’ throat. When he does, Louis opens his eyes again and they look at each other, Louis’ eyes somehow dark and bright, all at once, and it makes him think of all the times he’s woken up in a hotel room or on the bus and he didn’t know if it was dusk or dawn.

Zayn doesn’t know what to do, whether Louis wants him to climb out of his lap and pretend like it’s nothing or if he should stay there and give into the urge to kiss that mouth he thinks about sometimes. (All the time.) Then he feels Louis other hand move from Zayn’s hip and up, up, to slip under his t-shirt. Louis presses his palm to Zayn’s back, fingers splayed and when he tilts his chin up to look at him, Zayn dips his head.

Louis shivers as Zayn’s bottom lip catches on his top so he does it again. Louis makes the smallest, sweetest sound when he does and that’s it, he knows. So he sits up, Louis frowning as he does, fingers digging into Zayn’s back as if to say, _Don’t_. But when he realises that Zayn’s only turning to rest the joint in the ashtray, his fingers relax.

When Zayn turns back, he rolls his hips forward again so they’re even closer, so close that Louis must be able to feel the top button of his jeans pressing into his stomach through his t-shirt. Then both of his hands are under Zayn’s t-shirt, clutching his back, the calluses on his fingers from where he’s learning to play the guitar catching on Zayn’s skin, making him shiver as he takes Louis’ face in his hands.

Zayn looks at him one last time before he leans down. Their lips catch again and it’s careful – tea in his grandmother’s best china careful – and even though Louis’ cheek is rough with stubble and his lips are chapped, it’s so soft, the inside of his bottom lip warm and smooth. So Zayn presses his mouth against Louis’ – just once, just for a second – and it makes Louis sigh and open his mouth, his nails digging into Zayn’s back.

It’s already blurry, but when Louis starts to pant against his lips, Zayn can’t help but roll his hips as he dips his tongue into Louis’ mouth. Their tongues touch for one sweet second before Zayn curls his tongue out again, making sure it catches on Louis’ top lip as he does. That makes Louis _shake_ , his eyes closing as his head tips back onto the armchair and his mouth falls open. Zayn follows, thumbs sweeping across Louis’ cheeks as he presses his mouth to Louis’ and when their tongues touch again, it feels like they’re sinking – sinking, sinking – like a couple of pennies to the bottom of a fountain.

 

+++

 

Zayn knows that it’s going to be weird the next morning. They only kissed so it’s not like he’s expecting any public declarations or for Louis to walk up to him and stick his tongue down his throat (nor would he want him to). But Louis doesn’t even look at him when they get in the lift at the hotel, making sure he squeezes himself into the corner behind Liam as though Zayn’s about to pounce on him.

It hurts more than he thought it would and Zayn wishes that it wasn’t always like that, that he didn’t realise how much he cared about someone until they rejected him. But that’s the way Zayn is, he doesn’t know he’s feeling something until he can’t feel it any more, until he’s having a shit day and looks back and thinks, yesterday was a good day, actually. That scares him because he’ll never be happy, or at least he won’t know he is until he isn’t any more, and what’s the point of being happy if you can’t feel it?

All Louis has to do it look at him once – just once – and it’ll be okay. Just look at me, Zayn thinks as they get on the bus. He thinks it again as they’re walking into the studio, but he doesn’t and that’s what hurts, Zayn realises. Not just that Louis doesn’t want him or even that he regrets what happened, it’s that Louis could cut him clean out of his life if he wanted to. He could carry on, singing on stage with him every night and smiling in all of their photographs, but he might never look at Zayn again and the thought is like a nick in his heart.

Harry notices immediately, wandering over when they’re in the Green Room.

‘What you rowing about?’ he asks with a mouthful of banana.

‘Nothing,’ Zayn sighs, furiously stirring his tea with a plastic spoon then tossing it into the sink, which does nothing to convince Harry.

‘Is he still pissed about the tattoo thing?’

Zayn frowns. ‘He told you that?’

‘No. But I know Louis. He hates being left out.’

‘He’s such a moody twat,’ Zayn mutters, sipping his tea.

‘It’s part of his charm.’

‘I don’t know if I can be bothered.’

Harry nods. ‘Okay. Here’s the thing with Lou.’ He points the banana at him. ‘He has a heart of honey, he really does, but he’ll _never_ let you see it because he’s scared of getting hurt. Daddy issues. Blah, blah.’ Harry tilts his head from side to side. ‘I mean, he’s friends with everyone, but he doesn’t let them in. And the trouble is, if he does let you in, you’ve already broken him because he’s lost that battle, so he’ll spend the rest of the time trying to push you back out again.’

‘And this is supposed to make me feel better how?’

‘It’s worth it, I promise. But you gotta hold on.’ Harry clenches his left hand into a fist and holds it up. ‘With both hands. Don’t let him do it.’

Zayn sighs and looks over his shoulder at Louis. He’s laughing at something Niall is saying, his head back and his mouth open, but his eyes are too still. There’s no brightness in them, the skin around them perfectly smooth, and a couple of weeks ago Zayn might not have noticed that he was faking it, noticed what a horrible liar he is.

He turns back to Harry and sighs again. ‘Both hands?’

Harry holds up his fist and shakes it at him. ‘Both hands.’

Zayn turns around reluctantly and waits for Louis to look at him. He doesn’t think he will, but he must know that Zayn’s staring at him, because he lifts his chin, and when he does, Zayn gestures that he’s going out for a cigarette. He turns his cheek away, his jaw clenching, so Zayn doesn’t expect him to follow, but after a few minutes, Louis ambles around the quiet corner Zayn’s found, his hands in his pockets.

‘You alright, mate?’ he says stiffly, not looking at him.

‘Are _you_ alright?’ Zayn asks, taking one last pull on his cigarette.

‘Yeah. Fine.’

There’s a miserable moment of silence as Zayn drops the cigarette to his feet and grinds it out. When Louis looks down to watch him do it, Zayn knows that he isn’t going to say something and turns to press his back to the wall he’s leaning against. He should just leave it, he knows, and before last night he would have said, fuck it, and waited until Louis got over it. But then he thinks about the way Louis looked at him when he kissed him last night, his pupils big and black and open and his fingers digging into Zayn’s back so hard that his nails left cuts that Zayn felt the sting of when he washed his hair in the shower this morning, and he can’t leave it. So he decides to take Harry’s advice and hold on.

‘Last night was,’ Zayn stops to catch his breath and turns his head to look at Louis, ‘amazing.’ But as he says _amazing_ , Louis shakes his head and says, ‘A really bad idea’ at the same time and the shock of it almost makes Zayn double over.

Louis looks up, lips parted, as though Zayn’s just punched him, which is funny because it feels like Louis’ punched him, and they stare at each other for a beat longer than is comfortable as the words explode around them like tiny bombs.

Louis recovers first. ‘I-’ he starts to say, but Zayn shakes his head.

‘It’s alright. Don’t worry about it,’ he says, walking away.

When he gets around the corner Zayn waits, heart in his mouth, but Louis doesn't follow.

 

+++

 

That night, Zayn gets drunk. Stupid, sloppy, Harry Styles drunk. He doesn’t tell Harry why, but he must know it’s bad because he joins him, matching Zayn drink for drink until they’re so wasted Harry keeps picking him up to ‘shake the grumpy’ out of him, which makes Zayn laugh and laugh. He’s never loved Harry more than he does now, when they’re falling over each other and rapping along to Kanye West, Harry steering him away every time they see Louis. It’s exactly what he needs. Until Zayn meets a girl who has hair the colour of _Lyle’s_ black treacle then that’s exactly what he needs.

Her name is Nicole and she doesn’t look anything like Charmaine Campbell, but there’s something reassuringly familiar about kissing her. He knows what he’s doing, how to hold her face and when to pull back so she comes to him. It should make him feel better, but there’s something missing, something he’s not feeling in his stomach. But he tries, kissing her with everything he has, kissing her like he’s trying to give her his last breath. He can’t help but think back to being on the X Factor stage when he sang for his life every week and God, that’s what’s missing, he realises.

He doesn’t want her.

As if on cue, Louis comes over. Zayn’s sitting on the arm of a sofa, Nicole standing between his legs, and he’s kissing her so intently that he doesn’t notice Louis until she steps back. He’s about to ask why when he opens his eyes to see Louis tapping her on the shoulder.

‘Alright, love.’ He taps her again. ‘Time to go.’

Zayn stares at him. ‘Louis, what the fuck are you doing?’

Nicole looks bewildered. ‘Who’s this?’ she asks, looking between them.

Louis doesn’t look at her. ‘We’re going.’

Zayn shrugs. ‘Fine. I’ll get a cab.’

‘Like fuck Paul will let you.’

Nicole presses her hands to Zayn’s chest and smiles, slow and wicked. ‘If you can’t stay, maybe I should go with you.’

‘Yeah?’ Zayn smiles back and when she nods, he presses a kiss to her mouth.

‘Just let me tell my friends, okay? Wait here.’

Zayn nods, but as soon as she walks away, he turns to Louis, the corners of his mouth falling into a hard line. ‘There. Happy?’

‘Ecstatic.’

‘What’s your problem?’

‘I don’t have a problem.’ Louis raises his drink and smiles sweetly. ‘Just letting you know that we’re leaving.’

‘Well, thank you. You’ve been very helpful.’

He tilts head, his smile a little wider. ‘I try.’

Louis turns and walks away and it’s all Zayn can do not to punch him in the back of the head. But then Nicole’s back, her clutch in one hand and her jacket in the other and when he sees that she’s put on fresh lipstick, he forgets about Louis for a second as he slings his arm around her shoulders and walks her out of the club.

 

+++

 

Louis doesn’t say a word on the drive back to the hotel, absorbed in whatever he’s looking at on his phone while Harry and Niall sing That's Amore. So Zayn thinks that’s it, especially when they get in the lift at the hotel and Louis doesn’t look at him, just tucks himself into the corner behind Liam again. But as they’re getting out, Nicole stops to adjust the strap on her shoe and Louis brushes past him, nodding at her.

‘So you’re really doing this?’ he says under his breath as he does.

‘Twice,’ Zayn tells him with a sweet smile of his own.

Louis shakes his head as he walks away and when he slams the door to his room, it shouldn’t feel so satisfying, but Zayn can’t help but smile as he struggles to get the key card out of the pocket, his jeans suddenly too tight as Nicole kisses the back of his neck.

It’s not that Zayn has a routine or anything, but he’s done this enough times to know what he’s doing. He likes to kick the door shut then nudge whoever he’s with against it, his body – his mouth, his breath – on hers, like he can’t wait. He usually can’t, his hands reaching around for zips or under to hook into the elastic of underwear and pull. Sometimes he doesn’t even take a girl’s underwear off, just pushes it to the side, unable to roll the condom on quick enough before he’s thrusting up and in, the hours of kissing in the club then the car then the lift too much. And he likes it that way, when he doesn’t think, when it’s just happening, her thighs hooked on his hips as he fucks her into the door, so hard the chain rattles, fucks her until one of her shoes comes off.

With Nicole he does everything right. He kisses her behind the ear while she tells him how much she wants him, how wet she is, but when she reaches into his jeans there’s nothing. She offers to use her mouth but he stops her, burying his face in her neck and sighing because he doesn’t know how to tell her to stop touching him.

‘That guy from the club?’ she says when Zayn steps back, hands in his hair.

‘That fucking guy.’

 

+++

 

‘You’re a fucking head fuck,’ Zayn tells Louis as soon as he opens the door to his room.

‘But you still think I’m pretty, right?’ Louis says when Zayn pushes past him.

‘Nicole’s probably on _Twitter_ right now telling everyone that I can’t get it up or I’m gay or both so I hope you’re happy.’

Louis closes the door and tilts his head as Zayn walks into the middle of the room. ‘Happy about what? That you can’t get it up or that you’re gay?’

Zayn balls his hands into fists. ‘This isn’t fucking funny, Lou.’

‘It is a bit, ‘cos if she tells everyone you’re gay _Modest!_ will do a shit and die. It’ll be hilarious watching them trying to keep it out of every magazine from here to Mordor.’

He smiles and Zayn doesn’t know whether to punch him or kiss him.

‘What do you want from me, Louis?’ Zayn asks, shaking his head. ‘What?’

‘Nothing.’

That makes his legs weaker because he doesn’t. He never has.

‘I thought this was a bad idea?’

‘It is.’ Louis shrugs, the corner of his mouth tipping up into a smile. ‘But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it again.’

Zayn puts his hands in his hair and pulls. ‘You’re a fucking head fuck.’

‘You’ve already said that.’

‘So what now?’

‘I have no idea, but I’d really like you to put your tongue in my mouth again because that was nice.’

Zayn can’t help but laugh because Louis is the only person who can make him go from _I’m going to kick your head in_ to _Never leave me_ in three seconds flat.

‘Come here, then.’

Louis shakes his head and points at the floor. ‘No you come here.’

‘If you want me,’ Zayn puts his hands on his hips, ‘then you come here.’

Louis Tomlinson doesn’t often do as he’s told, but he does then.

 

+++

 

The next morning, it’s slower. Quieter. There’s no grabbing, no nudging of hips as Louis' teeth nip at Zayn’s neck as he says, ‘I can fucking smell her on you’ before he drags his tongue across Zayn’s throat as though he’s trying to lick the smell of her away. And it’s not as rough, as unsure. Zayn’s hands still shake when Louis pulls him into his lap but he feels Louis smile against his neck when he licks him this time, and he wonders if that’s because he can only smell him this time, aftershave and tobacco and the hotel shampoo. Or maybe Louis can smell _them_ , the smell of their skin bruising together and melting together and weeping together as Louis’ mouth moves up – up, up – up Zayn’s neck and under his jaw.

When they kiss it’s like the first time, Louis’ fingers digging into Zayn’s back, leaving cuts on cuts as Zayn dips his tongue into his mouth. They share a sigh when their tongues touch, chests rising and falling in unison as though they’re breathing each other in. Then Zayn tilts his head and slips his tongue over Louis’ and they melt into it, hips rocking gently. Louis’ hand relaxes, his finger tracing lines up and down Zayn’s back – up and down, up and down, slow, so slow – before stopping to draw a heart on his shoulder blade. Zayn shivers, then shivers again as Louis moves his other hand over his hip. That makes Zayn kiss him deeper, hands in Louis hair, tugging at it as Louis’ fingers curl around him.

It isn’t as careful this time – as clumsy – Louis more sure of himself and in a few smooth strokes, Zayn’s hard again. Then he’s falling back onto the bed and when Louis follows, his mouth on him, it feels so good that Zayn starts shuddering and panting his name, and he doesn’t even know what he’s telling him to do until Louis reaches for him and holds on with both hands.

**Author's Note:**

> I never know what the etiquette is to replying to comments here. Some people do and some don't and ARGH. But please know that if you've left kudos or a comment for this or any of my other stories, I really, truly appreciate it and if you ever want to say hello, just head over to tumblr! xx


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